


no rules in breakable heaven

by goblinsmacked



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Band Fic, Coming of Age, Falling In Love, Fluff and Humor, Inspired by Music, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Parallels, Unresolved Romantic Tension, i dont know if this is sad. u tell me, im not tagging angst bc it isnt!, its just v emotional
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-12
Updated: 2019-09-12
Packaged: 2020-10-14 23:35:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20609192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goblinsmacked/pseuds/goblinsmacked
Summary: Mark takes a big sip from his milkshake, acting as if the news of an imminent apocalypse wouldn't bother him in the slightest. "I think that's just in your head, Nana.""Everything is in my head, Mark."alternatively, with every guitar string scar on Jaemin's hand he takes Mark's in his.





	no rules in breakable heaven

**Author's Note:**

> warning for excessive use of mark lees full name, a shit ton of metaphors for being young and in love and pop culture references. good reading!

_now._

"Mark Lee, don't you get tired eventually?" Jaemin asks like a small child in a tall body, voice sweeter than honeycomb as his fingers dance over the guitar strings. His hair is dismantled - all over the place from bumping his head to the rhythm of Mark's drums, his jeans, with heart-shaped cuts on the knee, look anything but tidy, the buzz inside his ears feel like everything he ever craved for. 

"Tired of what? Banging these sticks together for two hours straight?" Mark jokes, droplets of sweat falling to the drum making a soft thud. "How could I?" 

_This is it._ Jaemin thinks, looking at his best friend like he just saved the world from astronomical damage, _this is what all rock stars sing about._

"That was good, wasn't it?" he points towards the now empty club, except for the few employees who are picking up empty beer cans from the dance floor. "Can you taste stardom at the tip of your tongue yet?"

Mark laughs, running his forearm through his temple, yet to drop the drumsticks, his hands feel glued to it, Jaemin knows what's like to hold on to your instrument like a newborn child. "Oh, it is sweet."

"I felt like Mick." Jaemin smiles to himself, yellow converses carved into the tiny stage, hands prickling from holding the mic for so long. It never feels like enough time, it starts with a bang and ends with a flick of someone's finger. Too fast. "What about you?"

Mark eases his fingers, staring at his hands in the process, red as ripe cherries. "Mostly, Mark Lee" he jokes. "Ringo Starr ain't got shit on me, Nana."

"He was never good and you know it," Jaemin points an askew finger in his direction, "you're right to strive for the best." His heart gets a weird thud, heartstrings pulling themselves in weird directions so he figures he's done for the night. There's so much post-concert adrenaline can do.

"You want to grab something to eat then go back to that shithole?" Jaemin unclasps the guitar strap around his shoulders, gently placing it on the ground, the arm balanced on the wall. It feels a bit haunted, to finally finish what they've been dreadly holding onto for so long, like he's leaving a bit of himself on every club they went to and now he's left with half a body. 

"I was thinking," Mark gets up from the little stool, placing his entire weight on the soles of his feet for the first time in hours. "Maybe we could treat ourselves. Stop at some diner eat something then hop in the van?" 

"Staying in a van that smells like a locker room is self-care now?" Jaemin jokes, cracking his knuckles.

"No," Mark raises his tone, looking oddly unsure for someone who's so confident all the time. "I mean, maybe we could travel a bit more. Do you feel like this is done, Nana? Like the end of a journey?"

If Jaemin had to be honest, true to himself and maybe to his mother, he'd say: Yes, done. I'm homesick and fame won't get to us anytime soon.  
But then there's this other part of him, the little devil on top of his shoulder rolling dices and making him take love-oriented decisions that'll make him roll his tongue and stutter a breathy _'no'_ out of his mouth.

"You don't?" Mark asks again, wanting to be sure.

Jaemin bends his neck, looks down at his fingers, everything possible to delay the rest of this talk. The truth is he'd spent little bits of forever alongside Mark Lee; he could spend all his life savings on gas and roadside hotels for him, even.

"I don't." He spits out, head in a haze. "I think we should make the most out of this soon-to-end mess."

Mark grins like the corners of his lips will snap in half at any moment. "If we're already fucking things up let's do it big time." He announces with all ease in the world, like he's telling his father he won't be able to make it for dinner, and Jaemin is left wondering if it is actually that simple for the other boy. 

If breaking the rules comes as swiftly as playing the drums and swimming during the afternoon. He guesses he'll never know, most boys keep secrets and Mark Lee is one of them - so be it. 

_then._

"Are you sure your dad won't freak out about it?" 

Jaemin, as any fifteen year old, is scared of being caught doing mostly everything. In this situation, scared for a million reasons, one of them, and in his opinion the most important one being: if anyone finds out about him wanting to be a rockstar, then he'll definitely end up not being one. Things are better in silent, except music.

"Dude," Mark slurs, Jaemin winces at the word. "Don't worry about it, he'll be gone for the entire weekend."

"What about your brother?"

Mark clicks his tongue, "Jisung's easily persuaded by five bucks. We're good." He assures him, popping a cherry tomato inside his mouth as soon as he finishes talking, eyeing Jaemin up and down til' the younger figures out it's best to keep his cool.

It's not like his mom would get mad at him - she wouldn't, couldn't, even. He's way too cute and he does the groceries for her, so some points are accumulated. 

"How are the guitar lessons going?" Mark changes the subject sensing Jaemin won't start talking. "Any progress?"

Jaemin sharpens his eyes, pointing a jello dirty finger towards the older boy. "They're not lessons, Mark Lee. Donghyuck is too uptight to be a teacher." He grabs the plastic cafeteria spoon and digs it into the mash potatoes, "plus, he's being paid with eyeliner and lipstick and I don't think the actual currency has changed."

"Alright," Mark raises his hands, showing defeat. "Stay mad about it, dummy." Jaemin scoffs, "I just want to know if you're enjoying it, having a taste of that rockstar life."

Jaemin smiles, genuinely, for the first time since he sat himself down on that cold metallic bench during lunch break. "Yes, I am, Mark." he shoves another spoon inside his mouth. "It's salty, a bit chunky. Definitely not made out of real potatoes." 

Mark giggles, covering his mouth with the back of his hand, way to graciously for a sixteen year old boy who barely washes his underwear on his own. 

"Good." he smiles, letting little puffs of air slip out of his mouth, then he raises his hand, and - for an unknown reason to Jaemin's comprehensions - he touches his hand, just lightly enough to go unnoticed. 

Of course it doesn't, Jaemin's high school ego could never remain calm about such groundbreaking thing. He touches Jaemin's hand for a second but the younger's sure it left a mark. "You deserve it, Nana."

_now._

"Don't you feel like you're drinking milkshakes while everything burns?" 

Mark, in all his doe eyed, blueberry pupils and starry-night-freckles glory, looks up at Jaemin like he's a mental case - in which, in some ways, he is. "What?" he laughs and bubbles appear at the surface of his drink.

He looks young, adolescent, juvenile, all the words in the world to postpone the use of… kid. Mark Lee looks like a kid; coming home from the park and being met by his Star Wars figures laying in his bed. And the straw between his lips isn't helping at all.

"I just feel like we're missing out on something big," Jaemin pushes all his thoughts aside for once, erasing Mark's picture from his head as he fidgets with the french fries. "And we're part of it, somehow."

Mark takes a big sip from his milkshake, acting as if the news of an imminent apocalypse wouldn't bother him in the slightest. "I think that's just in your head, Nana."

"Everything is in my head, Mark." He drops a few greasy fries and wipes his fingers on a napkin, watching as a little bit of blood stains the piece of paper. "My wounds are open again." 

The lines inside his fingers are often messy, mostly due to his insatiable will to play the guitar til' his head is left aching. The cuts keep re-opening themselves like they have lives of their own, and at this point Jaemin's just a mere voodoo doll.

"Job hazards." The older mutters, "I think I have some band-aids inside the van."

_then._

"Nana," Mark slips the nickname out of his tongue like a praise, "you should be more careful."

Tears start to well up behind Jaemin’s eyes. Eventually, one or two roll down his cheeks like shooting stars; Mark doesn't comment on it.

"I know you want to get better sooner, but pain isn't necessary." Mark reassures him, watching as Jaemin - who now looks severely younger than him - winces as air hits his fingers. 

"You're a natural." Mark starts, Jaemin scoffs. "I mean it, Nana. You're a natural, the strings aren't in a battle against you."

Mark watches by the corner of his eyes as another tear rolls down the boy's crimson cheeks. He sniffs softly, like a baby bird who just learned how to breathe. 

In the tiniest voice possible, Jaemin mutters: "Seven Nation Army is quite hard." 

And it's not like Mark wasn't aware, he tries to be of mostly everything, but in that moment, as he watched Jaemin breathe out little puffs of air, he realized the boy was a kid. No more than that, no less. 

Jaemin was a kid as much as Renjun who lived next door, but it wasn't the same. He was a bit his, not in a possessive kind of way, just plain black and white. He was the one person the universe decided to stick him to, and there was no amount of corny poetry that could explain it any better, he just knew.

"Wait." Mark placed a hand on the other boy's shoulder, "I have exactly what you need."

He left for a bit, making a quick run to the bathroom, tripping in a few Robotics textbooks in the way.

When he comes back Jaemin's face is a bit more puffy, the aftermath of crying. His eyes are still glossy and he looks up at Mark like he's about to hang constellations in his bedroom wall. 

"Here," he kneels beside the boy who's sitting on the floor, "give me your fingers."

Jaemin places the back of his hand on top of Mark's bent knee. The bruises look out of place on Jaemin's fingers, the contrast of blood with his tanned skin causing a turmoil inside Mark's stomach. 

"I thought you'd like this," Mark whispers, barely touching Jaemin's skin, scared to be too harsh. He takes a Hello Kitty band-aid off the pocket of his uniform trousers, watching intently as Jaemin's eyes get wide like a baby deer. 

He smiles, for the first time since he quickly called Mark asking for help, and it's so, so tiny that if you didn't know Jaemin you wouldn't even notice; but Mark has dreamed of sleeping inside that little crease of Jaemin's lips so many times it feels like home.

Mark wraps the band-aid around the younger's finger with utmost care, like he's a trained nurse during battle, and nods at his work as Hello Kitty winks right back at him.

"I do." Jaemin responds then, gentle. "I like this." 

_now._

"This van shrunk in size since last time, hasn't it?" Jaemin raises his arms, grunting as he struggles to accommodate his limbs inside the transportation. 

"It didn't," Mark starts it, doing whatever it is that he does to get that old (barely standing on four tires) van to drive that Jaemin couldn't figure out even at gunpoint. "You just keep growing. Eventually there'll be no room left for me."

Jaemin pictures his arms growing like tree branches out of the van's window, creating roots inside the cushion, green leaves shaking with the wind and twigs being used as home to little birds. It wouldn't be so bad - to stay still, settle. 

"There'll always be room for you, Mark." It slips out of Jaemin's mouth - and it's not like they aren't used to mindlessly joking, adolescence is still very much around the corner, but these days everything feels more real, like every joke that comes out of their mouths has a tinge of truth between them.

Mark pretends he didn't listened, too busy with driving; Jaemin pretends he didn't spoke. Then out of the blue, they're just two boys inside a moving van, wandering around nameless cities and faking wellness until they make it. 

Jaemin is suddenly reminded of a poem he read a few years ago during high school: _you're in a car with a beautiful boy, and he won't tell you that he loves you, but he loves you. And you feel like you’ve done something terrible, like robbed a liquor store, or swallowed pills, or shoveled yourself a grave in the dirt, and you’re tir-_

"Where to?" Mark's loud voice snaps him out of it, like a high voltage electric shock right to the heart. 

"I dunno. Anywhere you want, I'm just hitchhiking." Jaemin says, looking ahead of himself, watching as the miniature Spider Man's head bounces in the dashboard. 

"Oh, are you?" Mark turns his head towards Jaemin for just a split second. "So I can just go wherever?" 

Jaemin nods, maintaining a serious look on his face to sustain the joke.

"Rio, then." Mark jokes, "or perhaps Tokyo? Is it too far, do you reckon?" Jaemin doesn't respond. "Moscow it is."

The younger's act breaks in a heartbeat, and he giggles like a teenage girl in front of her crush, slapping Mark's arm playfully while doing so. It's all sorts of tender, he realizes then, this adventure of them. There's nothing, and Richard Siken could probably second that, more intimate than secret tenderness. 

Intimacy is to Jaemin what the promise of food is to Pavlov's dog, his mouth waters and nape gets cold just with the thought of it; and when you have someone as outgoing as Mark Lee as a best friend and band partner, you're always sprinkled with a bit of devotion everywhere you go together.

_then._

Mark Lee's bedroom looks way bigger during the day. The sunlight hits the mirror on top of his dresser just the right way for the walls to imitate what inside a dance club must look like; or perhaps a snow globe.

At night, though, it looks way more _intimate-_ like a fish tank. Mark is blue and shiny under the moonlight, his jet-black hair absorbs everything and Jaemin is left wondering if the boy is perhaps from the same planet as his or not. 

"You can sleep on the bed, Nana. I don't mind." Mark's sixteen year old voice mutters, barely above a whisper not to wake up his father that sleeps just a wall away. 

Jaemin is sat on the floor, cross-legged, looking all sorts of out of place with himself. His eyes, if it were to describe them, look similar to the ones of a deer in front of headlights, and his hair is pointing everywhere from anxiously running his fingers through it. The band-aid Mark neatly wrapped around his finger last week is still there, though a bit soggy.

"You don't have to. This is okay." Jaemin taps the duvet Mark spread over the floor for him to sleep in. "It's your house."

"And I sleep on the floor if I want to." Mark continues, Jaemin lets out an anxious giggle in the form of an answer. 

It's nighttime, ten p.m. he thinks, and everything is so quiet except for his insides - so he lays on the floor contrary to the older's wishes, stomach down, looking at what's under Mark Lee's bed: A few car toys here and there, a wrinkly teddy bear and some sticky notes crumpled together. 

"Jaemin?" Mark speaks after he’s drifted away and unsolicitedly came back to his senses at least five times. "Are you awake?"

The younger opens his eyes a bit, _"Mhm."_

"Can you come here?" Mark stutters. Jaemin hears the soft sound of his covers being pulled back, and for a moment he wonders if Mark's just playing with him, if he actually move to stand up he'll be met with giggles and a prank camera. 

But he fights against it, cause he's Mark Lee's best friend and it'd be devastating if he didn't. 

Jaemin is - what every fifteen year old boy is, and inside his baby blue pajamas he looks even more like the toothpaste commercial kind of type. Mark, on the other hand, sleeps with an old band t-shirt and sweatpants, exactly what you'd expect the homecoming king to. 

His hands are closed in fists and there's a possible chance he's going through cardiac arrhythmia but he swears he sees a shooting star just outside the window, rushing past the willow tree on Mark's backyard. As he moves closer to where the older lays, he sees the same one across his eyes. 

"Okay?" Jaemin asks for reassurance, to be sure he didn't read the situation completely wrong. 

Mark smiles, the one your mother gives you as you open the front door coming home from school. "Okay."

Jaemin keeps his heart at bay as he slides his feet covered in what was once white socks inside Mark's covers, clasping his lips together not to squeal or let out something equally as embarrassing or overdramatic. 

He lays his head on the pillow, hands clutching together underneath his cheeks; Mark mirrors his position, then suddenly they're one single person laying on a tiny bed.

Mark breathes in while Jaemin breathes out, and their bodies are merely touching, just knees and the tip of their toes but it feels outrageously sweet, like Halloween candy. 

Mark must be thinking the same thing, cause he decides to open his mouth, messing up their synchronized breathing. "Nana," he starts in a questioning tone, Jaemin nods. 

"If I ever get trapped inside a tower, would you save me?” 

This, Jaemin's brain wouldn't fail him, is exactly what comes out of the older's mouth, uncensored. His big saucer eyes look towards Jaemin like he just found out the answer to the ultimate question is forty-two. 

"Would you rescue me?" Mark asks again, blinking a few times and scrunching his nose in the endearing yet ordinary way he does. 

Jaemin's eyes, surprisingly, get even bigger than they already are, like two blueberries. "From up there?" he asks the obvious.

"Yes." Mark answers the obvious.

It's oddly unsure, all of this, and he feels like he's walking on a thin line while aching on growing pains.

"I thought you didn't believed in fairy tales."

Mark holds back words, body skipping like he has the hiccups. "I don't." He grins.

"Then I wouldn't." Jaemin answers matter-of-factly.

"You'd just leave me there?" Mark questions, basking in ever-growing teenage sentimentality.

Jaemin thinks for a second if this is some sort of cat and mouse game, if Mark would bite back if he didn't play nice. Or if they're perhaps, just two boys trying their best to keep tenderness still for at least five minutes, even if they have to goof around for a bit.

"Yeah," he rolls the word in his tongue. "You could figure the way out yourself. You're pretty crafty."

Mark is silent for a heartbeat as he tastes Jaemin's words, watching as the younger fails to keep his mouth closed. 

"Jaemin." He calls out.

The other still manages to get surprised when hearing his own name being pronounced by Mark's lips.

"What?"

"I really do mean it." Mark's eyes get filled with tears, none of them dare to cross their way to his chin. 

Jaemin's head bangs with alert sounds but his body stays still. He's scared that, if he moves just a little bit, the synapses inside his brain would get messed up and he'd end up cupping Mark's cheeks.

"Are you dying?" he says instead.

Mark's surprised, by the way his lips get into a tight line. Jaemin wonders again if he did something wrong.

"'M not." The older blinks his tears away, "at least not that I know of."

Jaemin gathers as much courage adolescence granted him. "Would you tell me if you were?"

Between giggles, Mark assures him: "Probably. Yeah."

And then they fall silent, hearing cicadas scream summer outside the window and the faint sound of music on the neighborhood.

"Okay." Jaemin breaks the silence, even though Mark's eyes have gotten exponentially smaller.

"Okay, what?" 

His hand, that was already red from staying pressed underneath his cheeks for so long, moves from there to between his thighs, and for a glimpse of a second he feels like touching Mark's knee wouldn't kill him; so he does exactly that.

"Okay. I'd save you."

_now._

“Are you sure we should do this?” Jaemin’s bright pink nose wrinkles at Mark’s recent decision. Though he’s fairly judgemental, he tries to tone it down a bit whenever the older suggests them to do something risky, but this time it’s a bit extreme. “We could get arrested.” 

Mark, so diplomatic and taciturn, doesn’t break a sweat at Jaemin’s words. Even if the worst case happened, it would just be an excuse for him to act out even more. “I’ve done this before, Nana.” 

“You trespassed with someone else?” Jaemin asks, eyes not necessarily big, just bright.

Mark gives him the shoulder as he takes the car keys out of the ignition and shoves them inside his back pocket.

The first thing Jaemin sees as he steps out of the van is the big garden gate that shapes the house like a cartoonish drawing. It's metallic and goes up, up and up; something cold slides down his throat as he eyes the thing. 

Mark notices, so he takes a step forward. "I'll go first."

And he does, like a born in the jungle boy, Mark puts his feet in all the right places, and in a heartbeat he's on the other side of the gate, smiling at Jaemin like he just won a prize. Or should. "Now you."

"I don't think this is a good idea." Jaemin stutters out, touching his own forehead with clammy fingers as he looks up.

"I thought you were a rock star." Mark teases him.

Jaemin, as unsettled as he is, still manages to bicker back, "I don't want to crack my skull in two, Mark."

Mark giggles, because that's somehow the appropriate thing to do, he extends a hand, right through the gate, like a quick-witted prince: "I'd save you."

Jaemin thinks about all the smart things he could say to brush Mark's hand off his face, but there aren't any, and even if it were for him to ignore the boy and move away, there'd still be a lump raging like a meteor inside his chest. So he does as he's expected to, for once in his lifetime - he grabs his hand.

And as quickly as Mark takes to wink back at him and grin his way, he's on the other side. The right side. Right next this lovely brown-eyed summer partner of his.

"Stay quiet." Mark whispers, still holding Jaemin's hand. He's faking an act, Jaemin notices, slouching his posture and pretending to walk on tiptoes through the rocky floor of the entrance. 

"Don't tell me what to do, Mark Lee." Jaemin answers back, but still just a breeze away from a whisper. 

They walk in silence for a few seconds, til' they're met with blue shiny light reflecting on a pool of water. It's bigger than everything Jaemin has ever seen, and for a moment he questions if they perhaps got transported to a somewhat cave, to the middle of the forest, or between the Egyptian pyramids. Maybe all three at once. 

"This is so big. How can someone have all of this just at their backyard?" Jaemin sighs; "It's outrageous!"

Mark scoffs, making his shoulders jolt. "Rich people are outrageous. Let's make good use of all this flaunting."

Jaemin turns his head towards the oldest like he just got slapped in the neck. "You're getting in?" 

He knows he is; Mark is taking off his jacket and stepping out of his sneakers, and even if the idea hasn't crossed his mind yet, he'd have to do it now. That's just how Mark Lee's wired. 

He sits at the corner of the pool, cross-legged, and looks up at Jaemin, who's still standing at the entrance, looking all sorts of uncomfortable with his noodle arms. "C'mon." 

Jaemin stares at his collarbones, then the way he cuffed his jeans just above his shins. Mark's still looking at him, so he forces himself to untie the knots in his belly. "'M not getting in."

He sits by Mark's side, legs just a few centimeters from touching. "You don't have to."

Jaemin wonders for a second too long if jumping in the water could cause something cataclysmic to happen, if it would equal some kind of re-birth; he'd exit the water with different limbs, his hair a different color and a heart that doesn't ache so bad for another boy. 

It's all silly, at the end, all playful banter. But still, he's sitting right next to Mark Lee, and he's looking at the sky like he's waiting for some sort of cosmic guidance, so Jaemin breaks the cold layer of silence between them as he's been taught.

"I like this." He mutters, watching as Mark takes his eyes away from the stars and sets them on Jaemin. His legs, then his hands clasped together in his lap, eventually his lips. Jaemin looks away.

"You like everything." 

_I like you, mostly. Then everything else,_ Jaemin wants to say. He goes with a washed down version of it: "Yeah, but this specifically."

Mark smiles, looking all starry-eyed. "Me too." Then like the flick of a light switch, he's getting up, taking his jeans off. Like it's nothing, Mark Lee just does things out of the blue, not because he's expected to but because he feels like it. 

Jeans mid-thigh, only in a white shirt, he looks up at Jaemin and squeezes his eyes like he's asking him something. Jaemin shrugs, and not three seconds later there's a big splash and a child-like wheeze coming from the pool.

"This is freezing!" He screams, Jaemin giggles. "It's late August, how in the hell is this freezing?" 

Jaemin puts his open palms up in the air, "You brought this on yourself, Mr. Lee." 

"Rich people are fucked up, Nana." Jaemin giggles a bit more, testing the water with the tip of his finger. Cold. Icy.

Mark's skin looks blue under the artificial light and in contrast with the water, his lips are dead purple and Jaemin wonders if his own are warm enough to make them bright scarlet again. "Get out." Jaemin demands, though a bit jokingly. "You'll freeze to death during summer, that's not a very noble way to go."

"Would be quite controversial." Mark ponders, floating in the middle of the enormous pool, smiling to himself. Jaemin can see his belly button through the soaked white t-shirt. "Maybe that'd be just the right push to get ourselves known."

Jaemin puts his index finger right to his lips, shushing the other boy. "Why would I want that," he starts, "if you weren't going to be there?"

Mark stops as if he just got shocked, swimming close to where Jaemin's sitting, placing his sticky hands at the pools' edge. 

"Is that true?" He asks, bright eyes all-consuming and big, looking at Jaemin in all ways a boy wants to be looked. His insides are like molten metal, dripping down his legs, but he doesn't care. _To hell with it, to hell with everything and everyone that isn't him._

He's met with all things at once, so his answer is as uncomplicated as it can get. "Yes."

"Doesn't fame come first?" Mark asks, small.

Jaemin looks down at his hands, then at the other boy, who's still got the same look on his face. And it's too much to bare so he looks back at the still water. "Than what?"

Mark's shoulders go up. Then drop down inside the water again. "Me."

In Jaemin's eyes, Mark has always been intangible. Dark hair and baby doe-eyes matched with lovely red lips and slender fingers. Plus a breezy personality and outgoing voice that could speak for days uninterrupted with a crowd of thousands - he's a charmer, Mark Lee is a charmer and everyone's at his mercy, even if they don't know.

Jaemin, though, is very much aware. And although he's silly and still has deep remnants of acute teenagehood, he knows Mark is gut-wrenchingly blood and flesh. He gets the heebie-jeebies usually and he second-guesses things like everyone else. 

He's human. Mark Lee is terrifyingly human. So much it makes Jaemin's heart drop to his toes.

"Oh, Mark." Jaemin calls out, voice strangled. He wants to pull the older off the water, and he wonders if he could for a moment. Get some tenderness-induced strength and pull him up until he's sat by his side. "Get off the water," he says instead. "Quick! Quick."

Mark complies only because he feels Jaemin might be a second away from crying; and he is.

They sit the two by the edge, Mark's dripping and there are no signs of towels near them, he takes the soaked shirt off and leaves it to dry on the marble tiles. Jaemin pulls his hoodie off and extends it to the other boy. He accepts it cloyingly even though it looks a bit more uncomfortable than just waiting to get dry.

Mark, as usual, looks a bit lost, glossy-eyed. Jaemin wants to kiss right between his eyebrows. 

"Listen," he draws circles in his denim covered thigh. "There's nothing," he pauses for a second, takes a quick look at the other boy breathing erratically by his side. The way his eyebrows are furrowed and lips pursed. 

Jaemin continues, "You always come first." He says it out loud, with all the letters. "Fame is...good? I guess. It - it might be good." He stutters. "But it isn't you."

He doesn't look at Mark Lee cause it'd be the certified death of him, he stares deeply into the bottom of the pool, picturing himself there, cross-legged and floating. Ears ringing with pressure. 

"It won't get me pink band-aids," he smiles. "Climb up the window of my room to celebrate my birthday at midnight. Or buy me orange juice... It won't even cheat on a chemistry test with me so I won't freak out about it, even though that's - that's doubtfully relevant right now. But I know you know what I mean." Jaemin finishes and sighs, exhaling a century worth of repressed feelings. 

"You do, don't you?"

Silence. 

"This is silly, I know it is. I talk too much, most of it is silly and then you're like, all dumbfound-"

Mark, as if his own body was betraying his wishes, gets extremely close to the other boy. Thighs pressed so close they might mend themselves into one. Whatever it is that got onto him, makes him bold to place his hand on top of Jaemin's, then slowly drag them together til' they're sitting on top of his knee.

Everything stored and locked inside both of their rib cages now eerily flowing through the moonlit place; all the love that was once neatly put away, is now out in the open. Just by a simple touch.

It gets better then, cause all-so-delicately, Mark Lee's face gets inch by inch closer to Jaemin's, like it's magic, like God themself is pushing them together. 

"I do know what you mean, you nerd." Mark assures him, talking so little it might barely be a whisper. The room is so quiet, it feels like they're under water, holding hands and looking at each other like the end of the world is about to happen. 

There's something in Jaemin's mouth but it doesn't get past his tongue, cause in a split second, Mark Lee's lips are on his, like an angel laying on top of a bed of clouds.

It so sudden, Jaemin breathes out a surprised noise, right into Mark's mouth. The older smiles into the kiss.

They're drowning in each other's lips, Jaemin realizes, since they haven't disconnected them to breath in what feels like centuries. And they don't want to, Jaemin can speak for the two of them - Mark's hand is still on top of Jaemin's and his lips are so, _so_ soft it feels like it was made to be exactly where it is.

Jaemin chuckles a soft sound, and it reverberates through the empty pool place. As daunting as it is, Mark still giggles, opening his eyes at the same time as the other boy. 

For a second it feels like they are both strangers, meeting for the first time. But then Mark smiles again, pretty and big, and it's like someone just rang Jaemin's doorbell. He's home again.

"What," Jaemin starts, clearing his throat. "What happens after I rescue you on that tower?" 

Mark's eyes get wide, star-infused. Like he's bickering outside the gymnasium during middle school. Jaemin wants to kiss the bridge of his nose - so he does exactly that. Because he wants to and he finally can. 

"I rescue you right back."

**Author's Note:**

> this was for all u touch starved lovesick overdramatic gays. hope u had a good time! leave a comment on your way out


End file.
